


The Most Exclusive Restaurant in the Universe

by carucath



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: ...I guess?, AU, Cannibalism, Crack Fic, Dark, Don't Examine This Too Closely, F/F, F/M, Gen, My First Work in This Fandom, Please Don't Hate Me, Silly, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-09-26
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:01:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26661106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carucath/pseuds/carucath
Summary: The Doctor and Rose go to the most Exclusive Restaurant in the Universe...
Relationships: Doctor/Rose, Ten/Rose
Comments: 3
Kudos: 4





	1. The Most Exclusive Restaurant in the Universe

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! This fic kind of exploded under me! Was meant to just be a one-shot but it well... got away from me I guess XD Hope you all enjoy!  
> This is my first time writing a fanfic so constructive writing criticism would be appreciated!

“Ah, we’ve landed Rose!”, the Doctor exclaimed, stretching his leg to stabilise the TARDIS as the ship juttered to a stop. Not the most gentle landing, but the TARDIS had seemed reluctant to land. Of course, this just made the Doctor more determined. Rose smirked at his clutter of limbs maneuvering the TARDIS. 

“So, when your leg is a leg again, is there anything special about this planet?”, Rose asked, almost pointlessly since she knew the Doctor would be explaining the details of what he knew regardless. However, she knew he liked questions — it helped remind him he was talking to someone else.

“Well”, the Doctor started, bobbing his head slightly as he stood on both feet again, “This is the planet Q-Zeen, a lifeless rock on it’s own — not one for inhabiting a native species but _very_ flat”, he explained, his brown eyes glinting with excitement and his thick brown eyebrows meeting his spiky hair. Rose’s own brown eyes glazed slightly as the Doctor continued rambling on, this wasn’t something she often found herself doing in the TARDIS. However, she wasn’t really sure how a ‘lifeless rock’ warranted such interest. 

The Doctor bopped Rose’s nose. She blinked and looked up at his frowning face.

“Hey! I just said the _most exclusive restaurant in the universe_ and you’re just staring at me like I just read out your mother’s shopping list!”, he said. Rose chuckled slightly but then took his hand.

“Sorry Doctor”, she said. “I s’pose you should’ve just started with that”. The Doctor’s face lightened and he chuckled as well.

“Yes, restaurants are generally more exciting than rocks. Unless you’re me of course”, he said, winking. 

“So, what do you mean by ‘most exclusive restaurant in the universe’ anyway?”, Rose asked.

“Basically, all of the inhabitants of this planet are chefs and they chef-away making very elaborate and _rare_ dishes! The richest and most famous from all over the universe come here for a once in a lifetime menu”, he explained. Rose frowned.

“ _All_ of the inhabitants? Surely there are cleaners too right? And waitresses?”, she asked. She shuddered to think of the toilets she had cleaned and the groping hands she had tried to avoid before getting her job in the shop. The Doctor smiled.

“Yes, of course. They may be able to help us in fact”, he said. Rose raised an eyebrow.

“Help us… _how_?”, she asked. The Doctor raised a finger in the air.

“To investigate where these chefs on a remote planet seem to be able to do this! Doesn’t it seem a bit strange to you that the richest beings in the universe would haul themselves light years away _just_ for dinner? Where do they get these ‘rare’ dishes?”, he asked, rhetorically. 

Rose nodded anyway. She then tilted her head, causing her blonde hair to fall over her eyes, and grinned widely.

“So, we’re _not_ going to be eating at this super posh restaurant filled with arty farty people?”, she asked, teasingly. The Doctor pulled the blonde strands away from her face and pushed them behind her ears.

“Exactly Miss Tyler. Exactly”.

The atmosphere outside was very middling in temperature, yet Rose still sweltered by the time they reached the _Exclusive Restaurant_ (chefs not being the most creative people when it came to names it seemed). Of course, the fact that she was wearing a long red cloak wasn’t helping.

“That’s the problem with dead planets”, the Doctor began, his own hand feeling a bit clammy as he placed it into Rose’s, “There’s no breeze or shade anywhere”. 

Thankfully, there was a gush of cool air as they entered the restaurant. A purple skinned woman, with antennae on top of her head instead of ears by the sides, greeted them.

“Hello”, she said, sounding to Rose like she was Welsh, “Do you have a reservation?”. The Doctor pulled out his psychic paper. The woman smiled.

“Ah, Sir John Tyler and Dame Rose Tyler”, she said, “follow me”. 

“John _Tyler_?”, Rose whispered to the Doctor as they followed the purple woman. The Doctor blushed.

“Well… makes it so that we appear as a couple, Smith is just a pseudonym for me anyway, so why not use your real surname instead?”, he explained, his voice squeaking in places. Rose smiled up at him.

“If we _did_ get married you would definitely be taking my name! I never wanted to be Mrs. Rose Smith. I said as such to Mickey! It’s so drab”, she said. 

“Well Rose Tyler, ‘drab’ is certainly not a word I’d ever use to describe you”, he said.

Rose wondered how long they’d been walking for, it seemed that they had passed through at least two hallways.

“How much longer?”, she asked. The purple woman turned around.

“Not much longer, it’s just that the most exclusive part of the _Exclusive Restaurant_ is right at the end”, she explained. Rose sighed with slight annoyance but nodded.

“This feels more like a hotel than a restaurant”, she said to the Doctor. The Doctor smirked.

“I suppose in size it is, and with the number of rooms. There’s a hierarchy of customers of course, from the merely Very Rich to the Obscenely Rich”, he explained. Rose snorted.

“What’s the difference?”, she asked. The Doctor shrugged.

“The difference between a millionaire and a billionaire I suppose”, he said. Rose rolled her eyes. So no meaningful difference then, at least from her perspective.

The purple woman stopped by a large scanner.

“This is where I leave you, just pass the body scanner and you will be greeted by one of the chefs”, she said.

“Thank you”, the Doctor said.

“Yes, thanks… uh, what was your name?”, Rose asked. The woman’s antennae widened, along with her two yellow eyes.

“Oh, right… it’s Bl’ree, M’Lady”, she answered, curtsying to Rose. Rose squirmed with embarrassment.

“Just ‘Rose’ is fine Bl’ree”, Rose said, she then gestured to the Doctor, “And he generally just goes by the Doctor, no ‘Lord’ nonsense with him, okay?”, she added. Bl’ree nodded.

“If you say so M’L— _Rose_ ”, she said, before scurrying off. Rose frowned at the Doctor.

“I don’t like this place”, she said. The Doctor nodded in agreement.

The scanner was rather intimidating since the other side appeared black from Rose and the Doctor’s point of view. The Doctor took Rose’s hand and the two walked through what appeared to be a black void... 

...Before appearing on the other side of what seemed like the same corridor. Standing before them were a tall blue man and a petite green woman, they both were wearing what Rose would consider ‘typical’ chef’s clothes, long white shirts, black and white trousers (albeit with swirls rather than checks) and even the long white hats.

“Oh, that is _brilliant_!”, the Doctor exclaimed. “You have the hats and everything!”. Rose smirked. The two chefs looked at the Doctor in disbelief. 

“It seems our scanners have found something very unusual indeed!”, the blue man said. The green woman concurred. She took several steps towards the Doctor.

“I don’t know if my eyes are deceiving me or not”, she exclaimed. The Doctor and Rose exchanged confused glances.

“What do you mean?”, Rose asked. The green woman grabbed the Doctor’s left arm.

“You must come with us”, the green woman said, “To the Security Kitchen!”.

“The security… _kitchen_?”, Rose asked. The blue man nodded.

“Yes, every room here -- except the dining areas -- are kitchens!”, he explained.

“The security kitchen is where we deal with security issues… like your friend here… we need to run further scans to confirm if what we see is true”, the green woman added. The Doctor tried to shake her off but she was stronger than she looked.

“Oh no, I’m not going into any Security Kitchen! That caused me enough problems last time!”, he said.

“We shouldn’t be long”, the blue man said calmly, while taking the Doctor’s right arm. Rose could see that the Doctor was trapped, his struggling achieving little at best. Rose pulled at the green woman but before she could do anything else she saw a long lizard like tongue come from the woman’s mouth. She felt a light tap her on the forehead. 

Suddenly, everything went black.


	2. Exploring the Most Exclusive Restaurant in the Universe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose explores the restaurant in search of the Doctor...

Rose opened her eyes. She was in the same corridor. She pulled herself up and leant on the wall. _Where was the Doctor?_ She looked down the corridor, there were so many passageways! Before she could collect her thoughts, a rather plump woman appeared. She appeared to be the same species as Bl’ree with the same antennae and purple skin, although hers was a shade or so darker.

“Hello”, the woman said meekly to Rose, her accent also sounding Welsh. Hers was more like a Cardiff accent compared with Bl’ree’s ‘Welsh Valley’ accent. Rose jumped.

“Hello?”, Rose replied.

“I didn’t want to disturb you but I was wondering if you knew your way to the dining area? The buffet has just started?”, the woman asked. Rose shook her head.

“No… but I don’t want to go there anyway…”, she started, throbbing her head where it had been poked by the lizard-like tongue, “I need to find my friend… a tall, thin man with spiky brown hair? He’s wearing a cloak like this one, but brown?”. The purple woman shook her head.

“I haven’t seen anyone like that, I'm afraid M’Lady”, the woman answered.

“ _Rose_ . My name is _Rose_ ”, Rose said forcefully, “I already told Bl’ree this, no ‘M’Lady’ stuff!”.

The woman’s antennae straightened stiffly upwards.

“How do you know Bl’ree?”, she asked.

“I don’t, I just asked her for her name… what’s _your_ name by the way?”. The woman flushed with embarrassment. 

“S’ra”, she answered, not looking at Rose. Rose’s irritation softened, whatever had happened it wasn’t the service worker’s fault. She had dealt with enough entitled customers in her time, she didn’t want to _be_ one.

“That’s a nice name”, she said to S’ra. She placed a hand on the young woman’s shoulder.

“Sorry for being rude, it’s just I need to find my friend. Two… chefs I think took him while I was unconscious. They said something about a ‘Security Kitchen’?”, she asked. S’ra shook her head.

“Sorry, I don’t know where any of the kitchens are — I just get given the food to serve to customers. And right now I’ll be serving drinks to customers during the buffet”, S’ra explained. She then looked back.

“I have to go back… they’ll dock me my wages if I’m late…”, she said. Rose nodded, she knew how losing pay could really cut someone’s bottom line. She looked around, she couldn’t see any doors. She’d have to try exploring.

“There’s nothing that way”, S’ra explained, “It’s a dead end, wherever the kitchens are they’d be through the dining area”, she added, turning to Rose and smiling. Rose smiled back.

Rose couldn’t believe the size of the dining area. It was huge! So huge that she had to take a few moments just to take it all in. There were so many different creatures! She saw a family of Raxacoricofallapatorians in long elegant robes not unlike the cloak she was wearing. In fact, all of the diners were wearing long cloaks or robes. ‘Best way to avoid offence’, the Doctor had explained to her, since there were so many species some would invariably find another’s typical article of clothing offensive. Cloaks and robes seemed to be the most universally neutral items of clothes — not a perfect solution but the best one available.

She walked around, trying to eye an exit. However, she could see little due to many of the other dining guests being much taller and/or wider than her. She sighed in frustration. She then spotted a relatively sturdy looking chair. _Yes!_ She could get a better view if she stood on that!

Rose rushed to the chair and climbed up on it.

“Hey!”, she heard a voice cry out. It sounded like an aristocratic man’s voice to Rose. Rose looked around, no-one seemed to be paying any mind to her.

“Get off me you stupid oaf!”, the voice cried out. Rose looked down, and saw that the _chair_ had been yelling at her. She jumped off.

“Oi! Don’t call me an oaf! You know you look like a chair?”, she barked. 

“Yes I do!”, the chair barked back. Before Rose could make another retort, the chair transformed into _her._ Rose stared back at her reflection and took a step back, it looked _just_ like her.

“Now I’m _you_ ”, the former-chair said, their voice now sounding somewhat like Rose’s but _much_ posher. The former-chair smirked at Rose’s agape reaction before transforming into a snake and slithering away.

After that moment of weirdness, Rose decided not to risk finding another stool, that could be a chameleon-ish creature too! She would just have to walk around the edges of the room until she found a door.

Rose walked around for at least an hour, but could find no door besides the heavily guarded one towards the kitchen. She had tried a few tactics to pass through, but it seemed that human ideas of flirting came across as a seizure on this world. Several of the diners stared at her. A few had ‘rushed to her aid’.

Her feet started throbbing with pain. At least they wouldn’t blister — the Doctor had provided her with shoes that have a degree of morphing power so that they could perfectly fit a person’s feet. Nonetheless, she leant on the wall. S’ra walked towards her.

“Do you want a seat M’— _Rose_?”, she asked. Rose nodded. She would have to wait until the buffet was over before she could find the Doctor, whenever that would be. She followed S’ra to a table, thankfully it was empty. She could feel the relief in her feet when she sat down.

“Do you fancy anything to eat?”, S’ra asked. Rose shook her head, but then her stomach gave a loud grumble. She smiled awkwardly at S’ra.

“I’ll take that as a ‘yes’”, S’ra said, winking with her antenna. Rose flicked through the menu.

_The Last Dodo-Bird from Sol 3, A Rare Bloth-Creature Egg from Brath, The Legs of Aggedor from Peladon…_

Rose stared at the list in horror.

“These… these are extremely rare, or even extinct creatures! Like, I’m not a vegetarian or anything but why would you eat something to _extinction_!?”, she yelled. S’ra scoffed.

“Because they can”, she answered cynically.

“But how can they even have a Dodo? Those went extinct in the 1700s and I’m not sure what year it is here but I’m pretty sure we’re in my future”, Rose asked. S’ra showed Rose the watch on her wrist.

“A vortex manipulator? Why do you have one of those?”, she asked. S’ra sighed sadly.

“Because they get us to do their dirty work in rounding up and hunting these creatures”, she answered.

“Why would you do that?!”, Rose half-asked, half yelled. S’ra slumped.

“Because I have no choice! Because I’m trapped here! Me and Bl’ree have been stuck here for five years! And the only way we can leave is to buy our freedom! Doing these tasks pays well, so we can leave sooner! But… it’s never enough. I just want to see my wife again…”.

S’ra eyes started to water. Rose stood up and wrapped her arms around the purple woman.

“It’s okay, me and the Doctor will help you. We’d had our suspicions about this restaurant and now that we know what the problem is we can stop this”, she said. She then stood back and smiled kindly at S’ra. S’ra wiped her golden eyes.

“Thank you, this buffet is almost over. I’ll try to help find your friend once it is”, S’ra said kindly, she then flicked Rose’s menu to the desserts section. 

“Why don’t you have the cake? You have to eat _something_ . And the cake is usually just a cake”, she offered. Rose nodded. She _was_ hungry.

The cake was the nicest cake she had ever eaten! It was not too dissimilar to a chocolate cake from Earth. Rose thought back to her childhood. She remembered her nan’s assortment of cakes, not that she’d just make them for Rose — it would be for the whole estate it seemed like! Shareen had tried to eat a whole one when they were both about 11, it hadn’t ended well.

Rose wondered what her nan would think of all this, she’d probably have warned Rose about gallivanting about with an older man — like Ollie from across the block had done. Since Ollie was now living in a fancy house with his ‘older man’ Rose had never really seen the problem. Rose chuckled to herself.

“You like the cake then?”, S’ra asked. Rose double blinked as she was brought back to reality. A reality consisting of a purple woman with antennae asking her about cake.

“Yes, it’s really good”, Rose said, “Though I was smiling more because this cake reminds me of when I was a little kid — my nan used to make one a bit like this”, she added. S’ra smiled sadly.

“That’s nice”, S’ra said. Rose opened her mouth to ask about S’ra’s family — but decided against it, it was clearly something very painful for her to think about. Like how she knew very little about the Doctor’s family, apart from the fact that he _used_ to have one.

The Doctor! Where was he? At least when she found him she could tell him what S’ra told her. Then he’d make a plan on how to stop the chefs…

*ding ding!* *ding ding!*

Rose turned to the end of the room, near the doors she hoped to pass later. She saw a Raxacoricofallapatorian, wearing the same outfit as the chefs from before, tapping a small swirling glass.

“Now that I have everybody’s attention! Let us give compliments to tonight’s chefs!”, they exclaimed. A group of six chefs then emerged, including the two that had taken the Doctor. The six smiled at their Raxacoricofallapatorian colleague.

“Thank you Olar”, the green woman with the lizard tongue said. She then turned to the guests. “I hope everyone enjoyed our various rare dishes!”, she exclaimed. She then frowned.

“I see that the cake has not been finished yet, of course it may seem like an ordinary cake but it’s actually the rarest dish here”. She smiled at the other chefs.

“Indeed”, the blue man from before added. “The key ingredient was nothing like on this planet — or any other one for that matter”. The seven chefs all smiled at each other.

“It’s not everyday that a cake contains traces of Time Lord”, the blue man said, smiling proudly.


	3. Rage in the Most Exclusive Restaurant in the Universe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose comes to grips with what she has just discovered

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is pretty short, but I found it worked better on its own than as part of the next chapter or at the end of the previous one

_ Time Lord… _

_That’s why the chefs had been so excited to see the Doctor…_

_ They COOKED him… and I _ **_ATE_ ** _ him?! _

Rose felt extremely nauseous. Yet, despite actually wanting to for once, she could not throw up. She glanced at S’ra, the young waitress’s face was one of horror. The other diners had very  _ different  _ reactions. They cheered. Congratulated the chefs on a rare find. Several walked towards the cake.  _ No, the  _ **_Doctor_ ** _. _

_ My Doctor… you can’t be gone…  _

Rose heard a voice, a cry. It had no definite sound but she could hear it,  _ feel it. _

_ I’m sorry we didn’t listen to you… you tried to stop this didn’t you?  _

  
Rose clenched her fists. The beings who had done this, and the ones who  _ let  _ this happen HAD to pay…


	4. The End of the Most Exclusive Restaurant in the Universe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose brings an end to the Most Exclusive Restaurant in the Universe... but can she save her Doctor?

S’ra reached out a hand to comfort the yellow haired woman, the first person she had ever served who had even _bothered_ to ask for her name. Who had seen Bl’ree. That was the thing the chefs did when the refugees arrived, split up the families. Being able to see her beloved Bl’ree again? She’d kill for that, which she had. For nothing, her debts seemed ever increasing her initial three year contract had been extended to ten and she hadn’t seen Bl’ree in so long… not since they first were transported to this planet.

Just as she had placed a hand on Rose’s shoulder, she reflexively removed it. Rose was burning hot, hotter than a boiling stove — but S’ra had no mark on her hand. Rose wasn’t just burning, she was _glowing_. Her hair started moving around her face, despite no breeze to cause this.

Rose calmly walked to the end of the room, ignoring the increasing stares of bewilderment. Her cape flew behind her while her entire body glowed a burnt yellow. As she reached the exit, she turned back, facing the callous chefs and restaurateurs.

“HOW _DARE_ YOU DO THIS!” _,_ Rose yelled, her voice sounding like two people were speaking at once. One the working class girl from the Powell estate, the other an ageless and timeless being. Unperturbed, the lizard tongued chef came forward.

“Time Lords were never patrons of this restaurant, so we were within our rights to take one for consumption”, she explained. The blue man then popped into Rose’s view.

“It was a perfectly natural procedure, he died as soon as the anaesthetic was administered — he would have felt no pain”, he explained.

_Died. Of course he’d died. If she had eaten him of course he was dead… Her Doctor…_ **_Our_ ** _Doctor…_

“You have all caused great suffering to many worlds! You will reap what you sowed!”, she bellowed, raising her hands. 

S’ra could only stare as almost everyone around her turned to dust. But not her — or the other waiters, or the cleaners… just the chefs and customers. She cowered as the glowing woman walked towards her. As she stared at her face, she saw the tears streaming down her eyes, the quivering of her lips, the trembling of her hands. She was _terrified_. Probably more than S’ra could ever be.

“Tell everyone that they are free. I can take them to where they need to go, the restaurant is no more”, Rose said. S’ra wordlessly nodded. She indicated to the other staff members and they all left the room.

_It’s very quiet. Is this what the Doctor felt? The… quiet?_

Rose looked at the remains of the cake. It had the Doctor in it… maybe she could do something?

She stared at the cake. Manipulating its shape to something like the Doctor’s. She leant forward, infusing it with as much raw power as she could muster, willing his life back. Her body glowed white-hot and became ever brighter until she leant forward…

*THUD*

“Ow!”, she yelped as she bashed her knees on the carpet. Her body no longer glowed, and she could feel her hair sticking to the back of her neck. She looked across. Just a messy pile of cake. There may have been traces of the Doctor in it, but clearly not enough to save him. He was dead. She had seen his entire face change in front of her own eyes and yet now… his entire body was ground up in cake crumbs. _Her Doctor_ . Why hadn’t they just listened to the TARDIS? Rose shook in horror. Did the TARDIS… _know_ this was going to happen? Saw it all happen… twice… 

She curled up into her knees and shut her eyes very tightly, now she only had herself to hold her while she cried…

“Rose?”, a voice called out. A _woman’s_ voice. Rose turned to see Bl’ree, who looked far happier than she’d been just a few hours before. Behind her was the reason why. Around them were hundreds of service workers of various species. Her now faintly golden eyes looked up at the re-united couple.

“What do we do now?”, S’ra asked, stepping past her wife and offering Rose a hand up. Rose took it, suddenly feeling very tired.

“I… I don’t know”, she said, “Everyone’s gone”. She rubbed her forehead, which was warm and sweaty. “I s’pose you all need to come with me”.

“But what about the restaurant itself?”, Bl’ree asked, looking to Rose as if she expected her to know everything. How she’d to look at the Doctor…

“I’ll handle that. I’ll release a galaxy wide message saying that the restaurant is no more and that the planet is under a 1000 year quarantine”, a voice that was not entirely Rose's, but came from her mouth, answered. Rose sighed deeply.

“Where do you want to go? Where’s home for you?”, Rose’s voice, mouth and soul asked. S’ra and Bl’ree looked at each other sadly. The various other service workers had similar bittersweet expressions.

“Well, nowhere”, S’ra answered. “We’re all refugees — nowhere wanted us so we were all sent here with the promise we could eventually become citizens of the head chef’s home planet after so many years service”.

“Which they kept increasing due to ‘excess demand’”, Bl’ree added bitterly. Rose bit her lip, where to send people with nowhere to go…

_I can help… we can give this planet an edge…_

“I can provide you with something to terraform this planet at an accelerated rate, within 3 months it could be full of life”, Rose’s mouth, but not voice, said. S’ra’s antenna widened.

“What!?”, she exclaimed. Bl’ree with simply speechless. The others murmured excitedly.

“Create life from the deaths, start anew for a brighter future”, Rose’s body relayed.

_A brighter one than mine…_


	5. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose considers what has happened

Once she had provided the terraforming technology that the TARDIS showed her how to use, and then a brief visit 3 months later to ensure that it worked, Rose was alone.

She had scoured the archives for any messages from the Doctor… nothing. He hadn’t expected this, no-one had… except the TARDIS.

The TARDIS she had looked into, but had remained closed from her… until now. She knew why. She could feel the grief of herself and the Doctor’s oldest companion. The Doctor would maybe bring new life as compost on the newly terraformed Q-Zeen, but his entire being was no more.

Rose gently eased the controls, feeling the guidance of the TARDIS. Not that she really cared where she went. She could go home, see her Mum. Rose was shocked at how little she cared for even that prospect. In the end, she shrugged, and switched to controls to random. Anywhere, anywhen. 

So, an ageless, timeless being left the Most Exclusive Restaurant in the Universe.

Along with her TARDIS.


End file.
